Headlines

Sarah Bloom Raskin was confirmed by the United States Senate today to serve as Deputy Secretary of the Treasury. Previously, Raskin was confirmed in 2010 by the Senate to serve as a Governor of the Board of the Federal Reserve where she helped conduct the nation’s monetary policy, regulate banking institutions, and implement Wall Street Reform.

Potestivo & Associates, P.C. announced the hiring of Nicole Kolhagen as the Director of Human Resources. She will work out of the Rochester Hills office. Kolhagen is an experienced Human Resources professional with over 18 years of experience. She most recently served as a Benefits Administrator for a local public school system where she was responsible for all benefit programs for over 500 employees.

The National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA) and four of its member organizations announced new evidence of housing discrimination by U.S. Bank, N.A. The civil rights groups allege that U.S. Bank maintains and markets foreclosed homes in white neighborhoods, in "a much better manner than in African-American and Latino neighborhoods," according to a press release issued by the NFHA.

According to the National Association of Realtor's Home Buyer and Seller Generational Trends study for 2014, Millennials—aka “Generation Y” or “Generation Next”—comprised 31 percent of recent purchases, leading all other age groups. Following that were Generation X (defined as those born between 1965 and 1979), which made up 30 percent.

Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, Dallas/Fort Worth appointed Frank Obringer as president. Sue Meyer, the brokerage's president since 2007, will transition her responsibilities over the next several months and then retire.

Committee chairman Tim Johnson (D-South Dakota) and ranking member Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) of the Senate Banking Committee announced Tuesday plans to move forward on a new proposal to wind down Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in favor of a new government backstop for private financiers.

Bank of America filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) with the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC), alerting the TWC of impending layoffs in three of the bank's North Texas offices. The notice was sent on March 3, detailing layoffs of 114 workers from two offices in Plano, Texas and one in Richardson, Texas.

In recent months, institutional investors seem to prefer buying non-performing loans instead of more solvent ones, according to David LeBlanc, managing director of capital markets at DebtX. His company is the world’s largest online loan sale advisor for buyers and sellers of commercial, consumer, and specialty finance debt.

A report issued by the Wells Fargo Economics Group noted that California lost 31,600 jobs in January—the largest single-month decline in over four years. Non-farm payrolls declined .2 percent during the month of January. The decline from December, 2013 to January, 2014 was the largest one month drop since September, 2009.

Asked about home price trends over the next year, 50 percent of respondents in Fannie Mae’s February National Housing Survey said they expect improvements, a recovery from a slide to 43 percent in January. A slightly larger number of consumers anticipate price declines—7 percent, up from 6 percent—while the share of those forecasting no significant movement was down to 38 percent.